12 Feb 2025, 04:23
A Letter for a Taste
10/2/25
What had she done?
Ruth stared down nervously at the note to be delivered to @Piérre Marchonné. Her curiosity bubbled, brimming at the edges, yet it wasn’t the same. It had once been sharp, insatiable--an unyielding hunger for knowledge, for the unknown. Now, it was dulled, a hollow whisper of what it had been. It wasn't as strong as it had been, and the realisation terrified her.
What's worse was that it wasn’t as strong as the need for another taste of that potion.
A phantom sensation lingered on her tongue, the memory of warmth and clarity, the illusion of a world where everything made sense. But that world had faded, and now she was left with… this. Nothing close to what had been her reality, even before a taste of the potion. The dimness. The weight. The aching, gnawing sense that something was missing, like a word on the tip of her tongue that she couldn’t quite grasp.
Her fingers tightened around the letter. Her hands were trembling.
It had only been two days. Surely, this would pass. Surely, she’d feel normal again. Maybe it was just her mind playing tricks, exaggerating the emptiness, making the ordinary feel unbearable in comparison. Maybe she just had to get used to it.
But what if she couldn’t?
The letter in her grasp wrinkled under the pressure of her grip. She loosened her hold, only to tighten it again, as though it were the only thing tethering her to the present. Her breath hitched. A quiet, stifled sob threatened to escape, and she forced it down. She couldn’t let herself cry--not now, not here. Not over this. Her vision blurred, and she blinked furiously, willing herself back into control. Ruth simply couldn't afford smudging the letter now. She couldn't risk a chance of getting caught.
Because if she succeeded in this simple task, if she got through this unnoticed, she would have a chance. A chance to taste again. To see again. To live in something brighter than this faded, muted version of her reality.
The thought sent a rush through her, something desperate and urgent, and all sense of caution fled. The 12-year-old just wanted to feel like herself again. Before it got worse.
She stole a glance at her hands. Still trembling. No, she had to stop that. She had to. Ruth sucked in a deep breath, then another, but it didn’t steady her. Instead, the deep inhales only made her chest feel tighter, her head lighter, her pulse more erratic.
She had done this to herself.
Completing the task was the only way.
She clung to that thought as though it were a lifeline. After all, what had that newspaper article said…?
"You could suffer through it, pretend you're stronger than you are, let it eat away at you until it's all-consuming."
Ruth was strong. She was, wasn’t she? She could fight her way through this. She could try. But why wasn’t she trying? Why did she feel like she was already losing? The thoughts clawed at her, whispering, accusing, taunting--until she couldn’t stand it anymore.
She ran.
Faster, faster, as if she could outrun them. The corridors blurred past her, the startled yelps of students and the sharp reprimands of those older barely registering in her ears. She didn’t stop. She couldn’t.
Out towards the grounds, her place of solitude.
Her place of escape, and where she would find the Gryffindor broom racer.
Out of the warmth of the indoors and into the blistering cold, Ruth ventured forward, suddenly determined to rid the letter off her hands. The snow crunched beneath her, each step sinking slightly into the frost-bitten ground. The wind nipped at her exposed skin, but threading icy fingers through her hair, but Ruth hardly reacted. She had forgone her scarf today, though she knew she’d regret it later. It didn’t matter. The chill was already inside her--buried deep beneath her skin, nestled in her ribs, winding through her veins. The Hufflepuff common room’s fireplace had done little to thaw it. A slight breeze in the air just couldn’t hurt her now.
At least, that’s what she told herself.
She exhaled, watching her breath coil into the air like ghostly tendrils before dissipating. Her gaze flickered around the grounds, scanning the usual gathering spots. He had been seen here last. Or at least, someone who looked like him. Ruth wasn’t particularly convinced by the rumours, the ridiculous tales of doppelgängers and clones, of multiple versions of the same Gryffindor flitting around the castle but with different house colours. Still she had never been close enough to him to know the truth, and could only half-heartedly accept the possibility. (The wizarding world never ceased to work in mysterious ways. To a muggleborn such as herself, Ruth was set to keeping her mind open.)
They had been on the same team for unofficial broom racing. That was it. Then, she had watched the Hufflepuffs crush the Gryffindors, much to her satisfaction. She was a prideful Hufflepuff, after all.
Beyond that? The boy and her weren’t close, not even a little bit.
And yet, here she was, trudging through the snow, searching for him. For a Gryffindor. For a broom racer. To hand him a bloody letter she couldn't read. And to make sure she wasn't seen at the same time.
What had she done?
|
's Grace ALMOST EVERYTHING 𝐓he sun rises for everyone, not just those who chase it. |
16 Feb 2025, 22:40
A Letter for a Taste
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Calming Presence in Effect: Figaro Affected
Animagus Shape in Effect
─|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─
House Colours: Gryffindor
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Calming Presence in Effect: Figaro Affected
Animagus Shape in Effect
─|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─
House Colours: Gryffindor
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
It would only be a few more days until the children of Hogwarts would have an opportunity to visit their peers in France for a strange event that had been put out and flushed throughout the school only this week alone. Something nice for Valentine's day, a little getaway.
Of course he had signed up for it. He had personal business in France, and and after debating with his brother over a few owl volleys he had managed to convince Romeo as well that the matter did involve him to the degree in which it would benefit them both to do a little 'investigative work' if one would. So, Valentine's day in France it was, much to Romeo's chagrin.
Yet there were still so many other things that Piérre had to do here on the 'home front' if one would. He may not have been good at anything he put his mind to, but that just meant that he was trying to do more and more things that he could prove his mind to, searching for the one thing that he was not bad at doing--and that was simply keeping an eye on things. Listening out for things. The woods, as he had heard solely from whispers of rumor and legends of the school, were starting to come more and more alive. He had been in and out of it time and time again, searching for the source.
He had in his possession bits of the strange vegetation that had grown in there that stank and bled strange red ooze and had been experimenting with it over the course of a few months but to no particular success. He had reason to believe there was a connection between it and the slug thing that had infested him as recently as only a year ago, the living black stuff that perhaps had a connection to the strange malady that had afflicted the Slytherin house years ago and had allegedly been cured by the Mad Nurse. He had so many little puzzle pieces, so many strange little bits of lore, but he could not seem to figure out how it all went together.
But they always traced back to the Forbidden Forest. It seemed that that was where it all came back to--the Forbidden Forest and cryptic tales of Hags and Living Darkness, of something concerning Harry Potter and his incarceration that was still a mystery, of Curses and of the dead walking among the living again. Something was there. He had to find out what it was.
But perhaps he was too much of a coward to simply walk right in. If there was something there, despite his being willing to go and seek it, to find it, to learn something, he simply was too much a coward to go physically and do so.
So much for being of the house of the Brave.
"Figaro, Firma. Stay/Stay Put" He ordered his familiar, pointing to the bag he had left behind for him to guard. The cat obeyed, scampering into the brush nearby and hiding himself amongst the foliage. As for Piérre, he took a deep breath and strode away, removing his shoes, pulling off his outer jacket and Gryffindor red sweater and leaving them to cover his things as well. He was left simply in black slacks and a tight short-sleeved red and white-striped gondolier-pattern t-shirt.
It was very cold out, but he wasn't going to be cold for long on account of the need to be high speed soon enough. Fingers stretching out from his sides in the broad, open air, he wiggled them once or twice to get a feel for the breeze, for the world. Another deep breath, remembering the feeling of change, of transformation, of the thing inside of him that was small but carried hope--that little thing with feathers.
He ran, and after reaching his top speed, he leapt and let the change occur as he spun at angle. It was always his face first, the feeling of little feathers poking through his flesh as his hair shifted from keratin to feathers, but the sensation ran down the rest of his spine, into the very tips of his fingers and to his toes. He shrank, smaller and smaller, until he was a small, multi-colored little blur, and then suddenly the little dot sprang upwards into the air fully transformed into the shape that Piérre had found last year--a marvellous spatuletail hummingbird. A tiny breath was brought into his itty-bitty lungs, and in a moment that blue and green blur took to the skies and began to flitter towards the highest crests of the Forbidden Forest's trees, ready to weave and dive among them and the peripheral trunks, scouting for the best way in--searching for the best way to find the heart.
If he was going to go into the forest... it was best to pierce the heart from the most accessable and direct route. He had to find it, before it shifted again. Before it evolved to the point where such a thing would become impossible.
He was not looking for anyone. The girl would have a chance, perhaps the best chance, while he was away from his things and instead threading about the trees.
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Statistics: Stamina 7 | Strength 8 | Evasion 18 | Wisdom 12 | Accuracy 16 | ArcPower 9
Stamina 1 | Strength 1 | Evasion 21 | Wisdom 2 | Accuracy 10
Abilities:
Keen Eye • Calming Presence • Beast Master [Cat] • Cat's Grace • Animagus • Muggle Condition
Very Small: 25% Stealth, +2 Stealth Checks | 25% Chance to Spot Passageways
Flight: 25% Chance to Spot Something Out of the Ordinary
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Items:
Wand [Yew & Snallygaster Heartstring] | Soda | [Violet] Deck of 52 Playing Cards
[Sharpened] Locksmith's Knife
@Ruth Fairchild
Jesters do oft prove prophets. 𓀚
I am the brother account to Romeo Marchonné & Zyva Hel Fae Skógrwight
24 Feb 2025, 06:25
A Letter for a Taste
𝕽uth realised it was hard to track down a singular person around the grounds, especially with the possibility that they weren't even present there. She wove through the scattered trees, relieving in the briefest moments when the wind could not reach her, slitting at her cheeks and skin. It wouldn't last very long-- she doubted him to be nearby any of the trees at this time of the year. They were suited for leaning against in the snow, nor did they make good for walking through in the winter, weaving around them as though obstacles only further slowed down upon by the layers of frozen grass underneath one's feet.
If someone was to go for a nice stroll along the grounds, where would they be? Ruth's mulling left her to wander away from the trees and gravitated towards the pathways along the edge of the Forbidden Forest. As she walked, she peered into the dark depths occasionally. Such tempting desire, to simply step into the forest and let curiosity take over. What was simply so dangerous for it to be considered 'forbidden'? Creatures, perhaps. In all her gloom, Ruth couldn't careless.
She halted in her search, turning her body fully towards the direction of the forest. Ruth stilled herself, quiet, her eyes piercing into the gaps between the trees at the dark. Her breath of mist snaked out in tendrils instead of quick puffs, her eyelashes tinged with white now that she had stopped brushing snow out of her face. The forbidden forest seemed to swim under her vision, the edges of her eyes blurring into vignette as she raised a foot, ready to step towards the forest.
The Forbidden Forest should have sent a rational mind reeling back. Its tangled limbs and secrets lurking just beyond light screamed unsafe, dangerous. But the young Fairchild was past reason. What was there to fear when she had already tasted something greater than fear itself? She licked her lips as though in attempts to catch the last drop of the potion. Ah, another dose would make her untouchable, unbreakable. She wouldn’t be ripped to shreds by the bloodied claws of wandering werewolves, nor would she be swallowed whole by the gnarled roots of ancient, hungry trees.
A pause. Yes, this was why she was here to complete the task. To seize the potion. "Figaro, Firma." A voice, interrupting Ruth's degenerating thoughts. She stiffened before turning excruciatingly slowly, the sound vaguely familiar but hinted jackpot. Sure enough, there was Piérre, speaking to nobody in particular. It seemed as though she had been so still the boy hadn't taken notice of her. Ruth frowned, confused. That was, until he began sprinting away and morphed into a bird. Even from the distance she noticed its shades of green and bronze, and that beautiful blue crest. A...a marvelous spatuletail.
For a moment she forgot what she had been there to do. She had never seen the hummingbird in person, only recognising it from her extensive reading that Aaron had begged she do before going out for birdwatching. The sight made her miss her older brother a lot more than she usually did. Ruth blinked, wiping at the blurry sheen that had taken over briefly, then looked back up. Piérre was gone, but the lump on the ground where he had been standing wasn't.
Ruth hesitated, then took tentative steps forward, her surprise arising. Sure enough, it was his bag. His bag. Who left such a thing unattended? This she wondered aloud, then began scampering in its direction. It was too coincidental, too convenient. Seizing the opportunity was all she thought about, her fingers seizing the letter between two fingers, swiping it out from under her robes--
A growl. Ruth paused midstep, barely a few feet away from the bag now. She cocked her head to the direction of the sound, then felt a sudden chill as her eyes locked with gleaming green ones, peering from a bush nearby. They sheened as the owner of such edged forward, revealing a beautiful silver cat. How cute Ruth thought to herself, then dawned that the possibility of Piérre talking to someone turned out to be the cat. Bollocks.
Still watching the cat watch her, she gingerly slid the letter into Piérre's bag, then placed a finger on her lips. She took a couple of steps back, her hands up as if to gesture that she took nothing and did nothing, then turned and bolted.
@Piérre Marchonné
|
ALMOST EVERYTHING 𝐓he sun rises for everyone, not just those who chase it. |
28 Mar 2025, 01:28
A Letter for a Taste
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Calming Presence in Effect: Figaro Affected
Animagus Shape in Effect
─|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─
House Colours: Gryffindor
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Calming Presence in Effect: Figaro Affected
Animagus Shape in Effect
─|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─────|─
House Colours: Gryffindor
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
The hummingbird was far away from where the sneaking was happening. He was trying to scan the woodline, trying to find the deepest gaps that held the best possibilities of sinking the closest to the Forest's heart.
It was the Heart, after all, that beat and gave the Woods their life-like--or, perhaps more than lifelike--allure.
However, there was someone left behind, and Ruth would find him instead. Even as she began to withdraw the note from her clothes, the green eyes slunk close and a low, warning sound rippled in the air. Rosettes in black blended in with the dappled shadow that he hid himself in, tail swishing lightly across the leaf litter as the trim muscles under skin rippled and lowered into a crouch that was ready to pounce at a moment's notice. He was watching. Waiting. Observing for a threatening move, an incorrect slip.
Still, he did stay still and silent--those minty eyes watching silently as she slipped the note into the satchel after gently raising the flap. So far the actions of the human were not threatening... but that didn't mean that he didn't still have a job to do for his master. Ruth pressed her finger to her lips in a hushing manner, and Figaro darted forwards, trying to get close as possible to the bag and to her--trying to catch her scent, trying to mark her smell so as to follow or to track before she attempted to flee...
But the feline could not leave the bag when she did finally turn tail and run. He had been given an order, and he was a very intelligent creature that obeyed his master more than he attempted to attempt his own agenda. When he was working, he had a job--he had to listen and understand that the reason for the commands given to him had a significant purpose, even if as a cat he did not fully understand them.
Instead, minty green eyes watched the girl leave as quickly and as suddenly as she had come, tail curling over forepaws as he lowered himself onto his haunches and his ears twitched in curiosity and intent. After a few moments, he stood again and then crossed to the satchel, sniffing it lightly in attempt to piece together the rest of her scent... even though it was likely all for naught.
The hummingbird had seen nothing... and the human in its body would be away for still a little while yet.
It had been clean. Exact.
No witnesses save for a voiceless cat.
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Statistics: Stamina 7 | Strength 8 | Evasion 18 | Wisdom 12 | Accuracy 16 | ArcPower 9
Stamina 1 | Strength 1 | Evasion 21 | Wisdom 2 | Accuracy 10
Abilities:
Keen Eye • Calming Presence • Beast Master [Cat] • Cat's Grace • Animagus • Muggle Condition
Very Small: 25% Stealth, +2 Stealth Checks | 25% Chance to Spot Passageways
Flight: 25% Chance to Spot Something Out of the Ordinary
───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Items:
Wand [Yew & Snallygaster Heartstring] | Soda | [Violet] Deck of 52 Playing Cards
[Sharpened] Locksmith's Knife
@Ruth Fairchild
Jesters do oft prove prophets. 𓀚
I am the brother account to Romeo Marchonné & Zyva Hel Fae Skógrwight